Front Page and Center, That's Where It Will Be
by Lilly Tagloft
Summary: The Time Traveller is at it again, this time going forwards and backwards. He's going to prove to the Editor that he has been travelling in time. Join the Time Traveller once again for a simple one-shot to prove to the Editor that there is a time machine.


He strattled the seat of the machine that was once inside the White Phinx statue and rolled the handle bars back. The image of the dusty laboratory soon slipped away as the year went from 1895 to 1820, when he drastically slowed down so that he went backwards a year per minute. The Time Traveller halted the machine once the spedometer reached the year of 1814.

The Time Traveller studied his surroundings carefully for a minute. It appeared to being in the late fall; maybe early September or late October. The scenic background seemed eerily similar to paintings that he had seen in the historical museum back in London. The trees were tall and padded with bark, except a few places where the local started gnawing off in preparation for the cold, cruel winter. The grass was living in patches and had a thin layer of frost on top of it from the morning dew. The Time Traveller took off the handle bars to the machine, wondering where he had seen this location before.

Then it hit him: this was the same area of Fort McHenry. It stood tall in prowd in the far distance; the American flag waved gracefully in the soft, morning wind. If the Time Traveller weren't Britsh, he might have felt honored to be able to gaze upon this historical landmark.

The Time Traveller looked around and saw a town not too far away. He jogged over to the bridge that crossed a deep river and he ran untilcomingto the outskirts where two hicks wre making a trade of some sort. He walked on past them, and didn't bother to acknowledge their existance. The Time Traveller walked into what looked like a postale station a few minutes later. A man with a wiry mustache and short red bread, who was obviously balding looked up from stacks of paper. "Can I help you?" His deep, husky voice echoed throughout the empty room.

"Do you know where I can find a gentleman by the name of Francis Key?"

"Who's asking?" he questioned eyeing the Time Traveller's strange appearal and jutting pockets.

"An old friend," The Time Traveller said eyeing him right back.

"He should be at the Barber Shop by now," the man said gruffly, "and if you would excuse me, I have mail to sort." He nodded solemnly and walked out the door only to find the Barber Shop staring at him from across the street. "That was easy," he said to himself. The Time Traveller sprinted across the fairly busy street, afraid to be squashed by a Claudesdale's massive hooves.

Upon entering the store a man about 5'8 stood up and said, "About time someone got here. I need to look presentable for being imprisoned, for in a weeks time I will be put into the British compound about 20 miles or so away," he stated sitting in a wooden chair. Knowing almost nothing about barbering, The Time Traveller put a blanket over Key's chest, as they do in England, and got some scissors out from the desk.

Key's hair barely passes his broad shoulder and the Time Traveller took the cold metal and cut a chunk of hair four inches that fell to the floor in a fluid motion. He continued to chop his dark, wavy locks as Key explained his intentions of getting a doctor out of the prison. He listened to Francis's words closely, and pocketed a few handfulls of hair when he didn't think Key was paying attention.

"That'll be eighty cents," The Time Traveller said holding out a hand when he had finished. Francis Key muttered something inaudible as he put two dusty quarters and three dingy dimes intohis palm. "Have a nice day, sir!" he called after Francis Key as he walked out of the shop.

**-x-**

He reattached the handle bars into the missing slots and the machine kicked back to life. The Time Traveller smiled proudly at his contraption, knowing how joyous he feels riding throughout tiem and the soft purr that comes from it that gives him goosebumps. Which were lining his arms as he sped forward in time and came to a sudden halt in the year 2031.

The scenery had darastically changed once again; three-fourths of the trees were long gone and the grass was worn out and yellow. Where the town once stood is a tall, round building that looked to have an offially large lens escaping through the roof.

The Time Traveller jogged over after putting the handle bars in his left pocket, as he routeinely does, and opened the giant, steel door that stood ten feet tall, letting in a stream of light drift through the hallways. He walked into the lobby area and asked a female with a blonde, beehive hair-do where he could find the lab to see who's hair he had in his pocket.

The woman pointed him in the direction of a door at the end of the cooridoor, with the name Dr. Batck in scribed on a gold knocker. The Time Traveller slammed the metal against the door and it opened automatically. A short man looked up at him expectantly after hearing the clamoring noises, "May I assist you in someway, sir?"

"Can you please tell me whose hair this is?" he asked holding out a small handfull from his pocket. The tiny male hopped up and grabbed the hair from my hand, put it in an invisible looking bag, and threw it in on a convayer belt that traveled throughout the room and weaved inbetween rather large pieces of equipment that was more advanced than his time, with all of their flashing lights and buzzing noises. He was certainly pleased.

"Here you go," the small proffessor handed off a piece of freshly printed paper that had the name, age, and blood type of Mr. Key along with the base pairs of his genes and important facts about his life. He thanked the petite gentleman and ran out of the building giddily. He could not wait to shove it into the Editor's face. He finally had proof!

**-x-**

"Interesting," the Editor commented on the paper along with hairs after swallowing a part of pork tenderloin, "how did you get such evidenctiary support?"

"I told you once before, I am a time traveller, and this only proves it. I got htat paper right before coming back to our time. What could I have used to make this? We do not have monster machines or green lights, and this is beyond even the best of a typewriter's work," the Time Traveller pointed out.

"It all seems so surreal..." the Editor sighed, "It could not possibly be true."

"But it is."

"I suppose." The Editor suck out his hand, "Congratulations, you have just got yourself a front page story."

"Thansk for making the bet, sir," the Time Traveller said shaking his rough hand. "I'll buy a paper tomorrow with the 100£ you owe me."

**-x-**

The Time Traveller couldn't help but smile the next day as he saw the words "**Local Inventer ----- Claimes to have Physically and Spiritually been to the Future. Could he be onto Something?**" sprawled all over the _Dialy Chronicle_.

**(A/N: We're doing the Time Machine in class for Language and we had to write a one page story about what would happen after the epilogue and where he would go, but it has to be only one page long. But because I tend to use some a lot more details than most people it ended being like two pages, even with cutting some it out.)**

**(A/N: Reviews are greatly appreciated ;] )**


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